“She’ll do it, Hurl,” I joked. “It’s always the nice ones you have to worry about.”

“Yeah,” Hurl said. “Ain’t that the…” She trailed off as she realized I was the one who’d spoken. Then she turned and continued out the door.

I knew that look in her eyes. Ever since Jorgen outed me as Chaser’s daughter, things hadn’t been the same between Hurl and me.

The others piled out of the chamber. I sighed, gathering my pack, preparing for an exhausted hike back to my cavern. As I hefted it over my shoulder, I realized that FM hadn’t left. She was standing by the wall, watching me. She was so tall and beautiful. As cadets, we kept DDF pilot dress standards. For daily work, we could choose jumpsuits or standard DDF uniforms if we wanted. We just had to be ready to change into flight suits if a call came up.

Most of us simply wore the jumpsuits, which were the most comfortable. Not FM. Alongside her polished boots, she often wore a tailored uniform with a jacket that somehow looked more stylish on her than others. She was so perfect, she almost seemed more like a statue than a person.

“Thank you,” she said to me, “for what you said earlier. About Bim, Morningtide, and the stars.”

“You didn’t find it ‘overly aggressive’?” I asked. FM was always complaining that the rest of us were too aggressive, which didn’t make sense to me. Wasn’t aggression the point of war?

“Well, most of what you say is utter nonsense,” FM said. “Windy bravado made as an excuse to tout jingoistic mantras instilled in you by a lifetime of Defiant indoctrination. But what you said earlier, that was from the heart. I… I needed to hear it. Thank you.”

“You’re a weird girl, FM,” I said. I had no idea what most of what she’d said had meant.

At his desk, Cobb snorted and glanced at me from behind his paperwork. You, of all people, are calling someone weird? his glance seemed to ask.

I walked with FM out into an empty hallway; the other cadet flights had finished classes hours ago.

“I want to make it clear,” FM said as we walked together, “that I don’t blame you for your attitudes. You’re a product of enormous societal pressure, forcing young people into increasingly aggressive postures. I’m sure on the inside you’re sweet.”

“I’m actually not,” I said, grinning. “But I’m okay if people underestimate me. Perhaps the Krell will do the same, so I can savor the surprise in their eyes as I rip those very eyes from their skulls.”

FM looked at me aghast.

“If, that is, they have eyes under that armor. Or skulls. Well—whatever they have, I’ll rip it out.” I glanced at her, then grinned more broadly. “I’m joking, FM. Kind of. I say things like that because they’re fun. Like the old stories, you know?”

“I haven’t read those old stories.”

“You’d probably hate them. Why do you always talk about the rest of us being too aggressive? Aren’t you Defiant?”